Music of Japan

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Music of Japan

• MUSI 3721Y
• University of Lethbridge, Calgary Campus
• John Anderson

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Cultural Values

• In Japan, maintaining tradition is important
• In pedagogy and performance, the emphasis is on
  playing music traditionally, without innovation
• Preservation has tended to take a vertical path
  in Japan
• Genres are transmitted from teacher to student
  through special lineages
• No apparent horizontal influence from co-existing
  genres

3
Social Class

• Musical/theatrical genres tell us about Japanese
  history and social values
• Genres are linked to social class and historical
  epochs
• Gagaku remains a symbol of the authority of the
  Imperial court
• Noh, the art of the samurai, emphasizes
  simplicity and personal enlightenment through
  self-understanding and self-reliance
• Kabuki and bunraku illustrate the fondness of the
  townsfolk for theater

4
Gender Issues

• The koto is believed to originally have been a
  court musical instrument played by men
• The shamisen was originally an instrument played
  by banished samurai who became wandering Buddhist
  monks who utilized the shakuhachi as a weapon
  when needed.
• The shamisen was played by men in accompaniment
  to the various theater genres

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Gender Issues

• However, women have come to play these
  instruments during the Edo period in sankyoku, an
  ensemble music that has been associated with the
  geisha
• The term geisha literally means arts person,
  whereby most Westerners mistakenly think the term
  refers to prostitutes
• Japanese women had been trained in the arts at
  one time to entertain gentlemen, yet today they
  are trained for arts recitals

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Gender Issues

• In kabuki, women were banned as performers in
  1629 due to the genre becoming associated with
  prostitution
• In 1653, reforms were again made in kabuki,
  restricting young men as performers as well

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Heterophony

• In ensemble music, certain instruments play the
  melody heterophonically
• Others mark time in regular recurring ways
• Heterophony two or more performers playing the
  same melody, but with small differences in timing
  or ornamentation
• Although ensemble textures are largely monophonic
  and/or heterophonic, great emphasis is placed on
  subtle differentiations of timbre and
  ornamentation

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Sensitivity to Tempo

• Relatively slow tempos with constant, subtle
  fluctuations in basic pulse
• Jo-ha-kyu aesthetic ideal is pervasive in both
  large and small forms
• slow introductory exposition (jo)
• faster, more rhythmically regular middle section
  (ha)
• and still faster, more intense drive toward the
  end (kyu)
• often with a sudden slowing down at the end of a
  piece

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Kabuki Nagauta Music From the Play Pojoji

• Nagauta music is played by the on-stage debayashi
  ensemble
• A corps of shamisens and voices plus a noh
  hayashi
• The ensemble has three main subgroups

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Kabuki Nagauta Music From the Play Pojoji

• Nagauta is a lyric genre of shamisen music, also
  sung in unison chorus in kabuki
• Shamisen is a three-stringed, long-nekced,
  freltless lute, plucked with a large plectrum
• Debayashi literally means a coming-out
  orchestra a music group in kabuki that comes
  out onstage to accompany a specific scene
• Noh hayashi is a drum

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Kabuki Nagauta Music From the Play Pojoji

• Three subgroups
• 1. Voice accompanied by shamisens playing in
  unison
• together they provide the basic melodic unit
• 2. One or more o-tsuzumi and ko-tsuzumi (large
  and small noh drums)
• play a supporting rhythm
• 3. Nohkan and taiko
• together play an independent line unrelated to
  the other subgroups

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Excerpt from Noh play Hagoromo (The Robe of
Feathers)

• This excerpt provides a brief example of the
  stately quality of the unison vocal music
  accompanied by the three noh drums
• It is the story of a fisherman who captures the
  wings of an angel
• Promises to return them if shell dance

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Rokudan No Shirabe

• One of the most famous solo koto pieces,
  Rokudan or Six Sections
• A koto is a 13-stringed zither with moveable
  bridges
• Its typical of danmono instrumental pieces in
  that it consists of several steps, or sections,
  known as dan
• The term shirabe, which appears frequently in
  titles of Japanese instrumental compositions,
  means investigation, specifically with respect
  to the instruments tuning

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Rokudan No Shirabe

• A short introduction of four beats precedes the
  piece, then each dan follows without break
• Each dan contains 104 beats and is repeated
  several times with increasing variation
• This makes it extremely difficult to tell where
  one dan ends and a new one begins

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Rokudan No Shirabe

• The jo-ha-kyu structure, however, is somewhat
  clearer
• The first two dan comprise the jo, or
  introductory section
• The second two, the ha section where the tempo
  increases
• And the final two, the fast kyu section

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Rokudan No Shirabe

• In this sankyoku version the instruments play in
  a rough unison
• heterophony
• instrument-specific ornamentation
• The koto part is said to be the meat
• The shamisen part, the bone
• The shakuhachi part, the skin

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Chidori

• One of the most famous sokyoku pieces
• Sokyoku is koto music developed in the Edo period
• It is set in a four-part jiuta form
• Introduction
• Song
• Interlude
• Song

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Chidori

• Can be heard as a solo piece, a koto duet, or a
  koto and shamisen ensemble
• It is also used as geza music in the kabuki
  theater
• The geza is the offstage orchestra in kabuki who
  produce the sound effects

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Netori Etenraku in Hyojo

• Etenraku literally means, music of divinity
• Starts with an introductory tuning-up section,
  called netori
• It is a togaku-style piece in the hyojo mode
• Togaku repertory includes music of Chinese and
  Indian origin
• Komagaku includes music of Korean and Manchurian
  origin

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Netori Etenraku in Hyojo

• The instruments of the ensemble enter in standard
  order
• sho, hichiriki, ryuteki, kakko, biwa, and gaku-so
  
• The main body of the piece comprises three
  sections
• each section 32 slow beats

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Discussion Questions

• Generally, in comparison to Japan, how does our
  culture regard the performance and listening of
  music 1,000, or even 500-years-old?
• Have you seen any operas or musicals in Calgary?
  What did you think of them? (Hint Watch Rent
  on DVD)
• How can the development of Western opera or
  musicals be compared to the development of
  Japanese genres such as noh and kabuki?
• How may we account for the lack of musical puppet
  theater in the West, and what might be in its
  place?

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Discussion Questions

• In what ways may we compare Gregorian chant with
  Buddhist chant, and thus contrast it with Shinto
  music?
• May we find equivalents to court music in the
  West? Why or why not?
• How have women been regarded in musical
  performance in the West in comparison or in
  contrast to Japanese women from Edo to the
  twentieth-century?